Geospatial comments sought

The Interior Department's U.S. Geological Survey is accepting public comments on Version 2 of the Geospatial One-Stop Portal.

In May, officials at the Federal Geographic Data Committee's Homeland Security Working Group published the draft policy advising agency officials about striking the proper balance of access and security and ways to identify sensitive data. The group published the guidelines for federal and local governments, private-sector entities and not-for-profit organizations that create and maintain geospatial data.

According to the Office of Management and Budget, about 80 percent of all government information has a geographic component.

Geospatial One-Stop and the Federal Geographic Data Committee support standardization and intergovernmental agreements on standards and interoperability for geospatial data.

One of the 24 e-goverbnment initiatives under the President's Management Agenda, Geospatial One-Stop is meant to be a central place for discovering and accessing distributed collections of Internet-accessible services data, maps, and geospatially enabled applications and Web sites. Other objectives for the portal include making it a resource for agencies to discover potential cost-sharing partners for planned acquisitions. Officials want the portal to be accessible online at all times.

Comments on the new version are due August 15.